Centering System-Impacted Womxn
by Chijindu Obiofuma
This is the fourth of a series of blogs that will explore e-carceration in the context of the COVID-19 global pandemic, the global uprisings in response to police violence against Black people and the continued incarceration of millions of people in life-threatening situations. This series will hone in on specific and emerging trends and changes in e-carceration, such as the development of new devices, the normalization of data gathering and location tracking, the surveillance of freedom fighters, the ways in which racism and gender oppression intersect with COVID and public health responses, and the rise of geofencing.
As the nation grapples with COVID-19, another crisis has come to the fore. In at least nine major metropolitan cities, reports of gender-based violence have dramatically increased. Boston has seen a 22 percent increase in cases compared with this time last year, while domestic violence arrests in Portland, Oregon jumped by 27 percent in just a few weeks. Experts predicted this increase, citing the combination of isolating measures like sheltering in place depriving survivors of critical social support and underlying risk factors like unemployment, income reduction, and limited resources increasing the risk of gender-based and family violence. Already, approximately 1 in 4 women and 1 in 10 men have experienced some form of interpersonal violence, and as shocking as these figures are, they are assuredly much higher. In 2016, the Department of Justice reported that nearly 80 percent of gender-based assaults went unreported. For Black women, this number is closer to 94 percent.
The spike in violence is concerning, especially as advocates find themselves increasingly unable to provide aid. But our conversations about these harms remain limited. When discussing survivors of gender-based violence, we persist in our exclusion of womxn in the criminal legal system, and this exclusion makes it impossible to fully understand how survivors are experiencing this crisis. Currently, there are more than 1 million womxn incarcerated or under some form of correctional control, including thousands of trans women imprisoned in men’s facilities. More than two-thirds of those womxn are Black, Indigenous, people of color, and more than 79 percent of those womxn are survivors of abuse.
The threat to incarcerated survivors is multifaceted and exceedingly relevant. Behind the wall, womxn are subjected to abuse which includes but is by no means limited to unwelcome surveillance, unwanted groping or touching, “demands for sex in exchange for goods or privileges or under threat of sanction,” and rape. Confinement makes escape impossible, and reporting abuse often results in administrative inaction while carrying an additional risk of retaliation and subsequent harm. It is easy to say the suffering of these womxn is rendered invisible by prison walls, but it is more accurate to say cultural attitudes about who these womxn are and what they “deserve” make it easy to dismiss the conditions of their confinement.
When discussing survivors of gender-based violence, we persist in our exclusion of womxn in the criminal legal system, and this exclusion makes it impossible to fully understand how survivors are experiencing this crisis.
In the preceding weeks, these womxn have faced additional risks related to the rapid spread of COVID-19 in prisons and jails. Over 34,000 cases of COVID-19 have been reported in prisons and 455 prisoners have died. In one women’s prison, 192 out of 195 women tested positive for COVID-19. To combat this, jurisdictions have temporarily released and resentenced thousands of people to home confinement. To combat this, jurisdictions have temporarily released and resentenced thousands of people to home confinement. Places like Cook County, Illinois and several jurisdictions in Ohio have dramatically increased the use of electronic monitors as a COVID-19 response. But for many survivors, opportunities for release may not bring relief. In the first instance, some jurisdictions are only releasing people who can guarantee they have access to stable housing.But for many survivors, opportunities for release may not bring relief. In the first instance, some jurisdictions are only releasing people who can guarantee they have access to stable housing. This will assuredly put survivors, who are disproportionately poor and housing insecure, in the impossible position of having to choose between remaining incarcerated under threat of COVID-19 or returning to potentially dangerous settings with a person or persons who may have previously harmed them.
It is easy to say the suffering of these womxn is rendered invisible by prison walls, but it is more accurate to say cultural attitudes about who these womxn are and what they “deserve” make it easy to dismiss the conditions of their confinement.
Should these survivors return, GPS monitors will ensure they are constantly surveilled, but this is a counterintuitive measure. Constant monitoring ensures survivors’ movements remain limited and may leave them vulnerable to parties who depend on them being unable to move beyond their homes, even to seek help. These constraints, somewhat shared with other survivors who are unable to seek aid due to the coronavirus, have an additional carceral layer. Though abuse should be characterized as an extenuating circumstance permitting survivors to depart from high-risk situations, even temporarily, without censure, monitoring restrictions remain exceedingly inflexible and rarely leave room for emergencies. Should survivors venture beyond their homes, the monitors will alert authorities to their purported violation. Their experience with incarceration will almost certainly ensure they will be seen, not for their capacity to experience harm, but merely as people capable of harm. Instead of compassion and critical interventions, survivors may be threatened with reincarceration.
While some survivors will be released into stable environments, they may experience additional challenges stemming from monitoring fees. Jurisdictions regularly pass monitoring costs onto the monitored. Fees may range anywhere from $5 to $40 per day and extract key resources from womxn who are overwhelmingly under-resourced and, per the conditions of their confinement, unable to work to meet these costs. Many of these womxn are mothers and primary caregivers whose home confinement will already significantly limit their capacity to care for their loved ones. Monitoring fees will only exacerbate these challenges, especially amid the economic crisis generated by COVID-19.
Constant monitoring ensures survivors’ movements remain limited and may leave them vulnerable to parties who depend on them being unable to move beyond their homes, even to seek help.
As we fight to protect survivors of abuse, we must hold space for these womxn. The carceral system works against them, as have the carceral responses to COVID-19. Fighting for these womxn, among other things, means challenging our reliance on carceral practices like incarceration and carceral tools like electronic monitoring while redirecting funding from the carceral system to support system-impacted survivors of abuse.
Chijindu (Jindu) Obiofuma is a second-year fellow at Harvard Law School’s Criminal Justice Policy Program. While at Harvard, she has solidified her interest in movement lawyering, specifically conducting research directed by and accountable to impacted communities whose experiences, analysis and intuitive advocacy inform their expertise. Prior to joining CJPP, she received her J.D. from Columbia Law School.
